


In Arcadia Ego

by asuralucier



Category: The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde
Genre: Amicable Exes, Anachronisms ahoy, Basil with a spine because that is my jam, Chocolate Box Exchange Treat, Class consciousness, Coitus Interruptus, M/M, Pre-Canon, University FWBs, a wee bit of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-08
Updated: 2019-01-08
Packaged: 2019-10-06 22:25:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17353757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asuralucier/pseuds/asuralucier
Summary: Their naked bodies elided in the most intimate way, Henry put his mouth to the inviting curve of Basil’s shoulder. “I’m engaged to be married, by the way. To Victoria. My father thinks it best.”





	In Arcadia Ego

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Binary_Sunset](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Binary_Sunset/gifts).



> Wasn't sure that this was what you were looking for, but I absolutely had a headcanon for Basil/Henry being amicable exes. Thought I'd share.

On Thursdays, it was more often than not Henry Wotton’s habit to drop in on one Basil Hallward, who lived in student digs not sanctioned by the university in a mostly forgotten alleyway the stuff of illicit hallucinations. Yet, Basil’s art could only live in a pigsty that shit, where the walls were marred with things much worse than paint. 

“...Hello, Harry. Tea?” 

There was a resigned note to Basil’s voice, as if this particular ritual was forced upon him without his say-so. And yet, he’d never turned Henry away either. The reason being that Basil was afraid of afraid of Henry’s “overtures.” 

“Yes, please. But I don’t have overtures,” Henry pouted. He knew that this was expected of him. 

“Not yet, you don’t,” Basil murmured a touch darkly and goes to put on the kettle. 

“You wound me, Basil.” 

“And you enjoy it,” Basil said, with only the smallest bit of smugness as he crossed to the door to help Henry with his jacket. He didn’t have to, but there was something about bad habits and the way they compelled a man to return to the same poisoned well and to draw from it, over and over again. 

“A little,” Henry admitted. He didn’t mind admitting that. He also didn’t mind the way Basil grabbed at the lapel of his coat to get at his mouth. Basil preferred coffee to tea. 

 

Their naked bodies elided in the most intimate way, Henry put his mouth to the inviting curve of Basil’s shoulder. “I’m engaged to be married, by the way. To Victoria. My father thinks it best.” 

Victoria was really a Lady Victoria Henry, whose father was ostensibly the Duke of Devonshire. She had a tongue sharp enough that Henry almost considered her attractive on paper. They’d only met once in person, at a ball where nearly everyone pretended to speak French. Henry’s French, admittedly, wasn’t up to standard, but after spending hours parlez-vous-ing, he had to admit he wasn’t terrible. And he was undoubtedly a fan of terrible, but only just in a particular way. 

“And you? What do you think?” 

“I’ve thought of everything. From swanning out of my bedroom window, to England, you know, just in general.” 

Even with his head pressed keenly against a pillow, Henry felt Basil rolling his eyes, “That’s not what I meant.” 

“No, that was only what I meant,” Henry assented with a smile half-cocked. It seemed pointless to argue. 

Basil slapped smartly at Henry’s thigh and they broke apart. At least one part of Henry regetted this immediately and immensely. 

“...I’m sorry, Basil. But it’s not for a while yet. It’s not something we have to think about right away. I’m even sorrier that I brought it up.” 

Basil passed a finger over a mark on the line of his neck left by Henry’s teeth, “You’re not sorry, Harry. You’re either cruel, or stupid.” He swung his legs off of the bed, which gave a stubborn creak and made Henry feel objectively worse about the whole affair. He’d long associated the creaking of Basil’s dumb bed with a certain end. This end sat in the room menacingly, differently. As if it was the last. 

“Between the two I’d almost always picked stupid,” said Henry, trying as he might, to sidestep the menace’s grip reaching tellingly to his throat. “I’m offended you’d even ask.” 

Basil just looked at him, and there was nothing in his eyes that was kind. Between the two of them, Henry rather thought that they had this obfuscation thing down pat. Fair was foul and foul was fair and of course, cruel [was] kind and vice versa. 

“I wish you’d stop looking at me like I was a cockroach, Basil.” 

“Do you? Because roaches belong in this flat,” Basil remarked, but he did turn his eyes away. 

“All right, fine. I deserved that. Please don’t get dressed. There’s still time.” 

In what Henry could only assume was protest, Basil slung white linen over his back anyway and turned. It was as if he’d put on another face entirely. A face that was capable of dealing with roaches in his flat, no doubt, “What are we doing, anyway, Harry? This?” 

“I don’t know,” said Henry. “I suppose we’d never talked about it.” 

Basil touched a hand to Henry’s face and another time, Henry might have felt ashamed of a like-minded heat that prickled up the pores of his skin and then somewhere else, too. “Talking is what you’re good at, Harry. So you keep telling me.” 

“Like I said, I’m stupid,” Henry smiled with only one side of his mouth. He felt forgiven, even if he wasn’t entirely. He took Basil’s wrist and turned his palm, so he could run the tip of his nose along a blood vein. He felt Basil soften, rather than anything else. The moment that the other man acquiesced to press a kiss to his forehead, it felt not like forgiveness as such; the kiss (and by extension Basil) was still friendly enough, if a tad resigned. 

Henry shifted for a kiss that traded skin for Basil’s mouth and resolved not to think about it anymore. He was good at that too.

After all, they still had time. Speaking of time, it didn’t take long for them to resume their tangle and for Basil to curl his fingers in Henry’s hair, “...I suppose you are a bit, Harry. It’s why I know I’ll get tired of you.” 

“You mean, eventually?” Henry supplied, like some sort of horrible drunk sap. (Thinking back on it, he was only one of those things, and that only secretly.) 

“If you’d like,” Basil said. “Eventually.” 

 

In his London flat, Basil watched Henry watch Dorian. Gaze upon gaze imposed upon a lovely indolent spine, as Basil declared that Dorian could take a small break from sitting still. 

“Tea, Dorian?” 

“I’d prefer coffee, thanks, if you have it.” 

Basil went into the kitchen. 

“He prefers _coffee_ , Basil,” said Henry mockingly as if he was jealous. But Basil thought he wasn’t. Henry would have frowned on jealousy, calling it unbecoming, but one man’s envy was another man’s ambition. 

“I’m not -- not with him, Harry, just in case you were wondering,” said Basil. 

“But you should,” Henry shrugged. “An Adonis like that. You’d want to sink your claws into him before someone worse puts fanciful ideas into his head.” 

“...Someone like you, you mean,” Basil makes Henry tea, no milk and two sugars. A most unremarkable fact still etched in his brain, like how his hands still knew other habits; by Henry’s own reckoning he was often hoisted by his own persuasion. Basil had to stop himself, “Here, Harry. Drink your tea before it gets cold.”


End file.
